


Mutantis Idiotis (Remix of "Of Cantaloupes and Scribbles")

by Fullmetalcarer



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies)
Genre: Charles Is a Big Dorkface, Charles Xavier has a Ph.D in Adorable, Erik Has Feelings, Erik is Crushing Harder than a 12-year Old Girl, Fluff, M/M, Mutual Pining, Student!Charles, author!erik
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-12
Updated: 2017-07-12
Packaged: 2018-11-29 14:27:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11442789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fullmetalcarer/pseuds/Fullmetalcarer
Summary: Turns out the life of Young Adult fiction writer Erik Lehnsherr closely resembles his books.





	Mutantis Idiotis (Remix of "Of Cantaloupes and Scribbles")

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bocje_ce_ustu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bocje_ce_ustu/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Of Cantaloupes and Scribbles](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7724914) by [bocje_ce_ustu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bocje_ce_ustu/pseuds/bocje_ce_ustu). 
  * In response to a prompt by [bocje_ce_ustu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bocje_ce_ustu/pseuds/bocje_ce_ustu) in the [xmen_remix_madness2017](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/xmen_remix_madness2017) collection. 



> I was utterly taken by bocje_ce_ustu's idea of Erik as an author and Charles as his cheerleader/proofreader.

Erik had known Charles for three years. He'd literally fallen into his arms. Erik had exited the elevator to find the corridor strewn with partially unpacked cardboard boxes. He'd been grumpily picking his way through them when his foot caught in a cable tie and he'd plummeted to the ground. His fall had been interrupted by something warm and solid. Someone warm and solid. Charles. All blue eyes and red lips and pale skin and tousled dark hair. Charles had apologised profusely and somehow antisocial, taciturn Erik had found himself drinking tea - he didn't even like tea - and eating scones with a warm, friendly, talkative twenty year old.

Things had gone on from there. Erik hadn't meant to become friends with Charles, but somehow he hadn't been able to stop himself. He knew more about Charles than he did about anyone except his mother, Edie. Charles could bake, but not cook. He adored his wild-child sister, Raven. He had just graduated from Columbia and was starting his PhD when Erik had first met him. He could talk about genetics until the cows came home. He was passionately involved in social justice and not in a "you are evil, go kill yourself" way on social media. He volunteered, he protested, he donated. He could afford to donate because he was staggeringly rich.

When he'd first moved in, Erik had asking him how a student could possibly afford a large apartment in a good neighbourhood. Charles had blushed and muttered something about an inheritance. Erik had googled him and found out a truly ugly court case had just been settled in his favour. He'd been suing his step-father, who'd been arguing that Charles was unfit to manage his fortune. Kurt Marko alleged that Charles was a mentally unstable, habitual drug abuser, who was into the chemsex scene. There were counter-allegations that Kurt and his son, Cain, had physically and emotionally abused Charles for years. Erik never mentioned his internet search to Charles. If he wanted to tell Erik, he would and, in time, he did.

Charles knew more about Erik then anyone except Edie. He knew Erik came over as cold and unfriendly partly because he was shy. He knew he'd fallen under the influence of charismatic gay rights campaigner, Sebastian Shaw, when he was just a teenager and had had a psychologically abusive relationship with the much older man. Shaw had threatened Edie when Erik had broken off the unequal relationship. He knew Erik loved to run early in the morning, just as dawn was breaking and late at night, sometimes after midnight. He knew Erik could cook, but wasn't a great baker. And he knew Erik was an author.

Erik had been writing young adult novels for almost a decade. They centred round a universe where humans were mutating into beings with special powers. The key figures in the books were Magneto and Professor X. Magneto could manipulate metal and magnetic fields. Professor X was a powerful telepath. There were lots of other characters and some stories focused on them rather than the Prof or Mags, but the books where they took centre stage were the most popular.

The USP of the "Mutatis Mutandis" series was that the Professor and Magneto were lovers. They had a complicated realtionship; friends, colleagues, lovers, adversaries, enemies. They both fought passionately for mutant rights, but in very different ways. Magneto was like "kill all the humans and any mutants who oppose us", while Professor X was more "hug it out, everyone".

Erik had been struck by how little fantasy/sci-fi there was for LGBT+ kids. He'd sent his manuscript to a niche publishing house and had got a call to come see one of the editors. He'd sat in front of Emma Frost, who'd looked like she belonged on a cat-walk, not behind a desk groaning with papers, and listened as she tore his story apart.

"I don't understand why you had me come here just to be rejected. Why didn't you just send me an email?" he'd snarled, disappointed and furious.

Frost, the bitch, had laughed and said:

"Oh, sugar, I'm not rejecting you. We want to publish you, but there's a lot of work to be done before your novel's ready to go to print."

"Mind Over Metal" had been a storming success for Different But Equal publishing, as had all his subsequent novels. Turns out teens were desperate for a bit of gay sci-fi. The Prof and Mags never got much further than holding hands, kissing and a bit of light frottage before what Charles called "The Three Dots of Doom" intervened. Erik had suggested hand-jobs, cock-sucking and a hint of anal, but Frost had been firm that they were to remain PG-13. Secretly Erik had been relieved, he hadn't the first idea of how to go about writing teen-friendly sex. Erik had stuck with DBE despite many lucrative offers from other publishers. Frosty the Snow Queen was still his editor.

While he'd been churning out YA fiction, he'd also been working on the great American, Jewish, Gay novel. After numerous rewrites and one junking-it-and-starting-from-scratch, he was about three quarters of the way through. He was wrestling with a scene he was trying to show from multiple viewpoints when Charles wandered in.

"How's it going?"

"It's not."

Charles made a sympathetic noise.

"Here, have an apricot Danish, fresh from the oven."

Erik fell upon the Danish like a starving man, which he was as he'd forgotten to eat breakfast and lunch.

Charles tutted and shook his head.

"No wonder you're so slim, you never eat."

"Since when are you my Jewish mother?"

"I'm your WASP mother, darling, Edie's the Jewish one. Do you want me to have a look?"

Charles had been acting as Erik's unofficial proofreader for over two years. He had an excellent eye for anything that didn't ring true. Erik shoved the laptop at him. Charles' cornflower blue eyes flickered over the screen. He was a speed reader. He bit his juicy, red lower lip. Erik tried to concentrate on the Danish and fight down the urge to wrestle Charles to the tastefully distressed wooden floor and ravish him.

He'd been fighting his attraction to Charles for years now. Erik's romantic record was poor, bordering on disastrous and he didn't want to lose Charles as a friend. He made do with one night stands and if he occasionally yelled "Charles" at the critical moment, well, they were random encounters so who cared? Plus Charles had never shown any romantic interest in Erik, was ten years younger than him, was kind, brilliant, beautiful and loaded. Not a match made in heaven.

Charles turned those blue eyes on him. He looked mournful, but composed. Erik knew what was coming.

"It doesn't work at all, Erik. It's confusing and the different POVs aren't differentiated enough. I'd scrap it from "the view over the city was a distraction" and start again."

"Fine," he sighed. "I wish it came as easily as my Prof X and Maggie crap."

"Don't call it that," snapped Charles, tone unusually sharp.

"Well, it is crap."

"No it's not. You've won all kinds of awards for the "Mutatis Mutandis" series."

Erik snorted. "Yeah, children's literature awards."

"And what's wrong with that? Aren't children an important part of the reading public? Isn't getting them into the world of literature absolutely vital? Isn't giving gay kids characters they can identify with a worthy undertaking?"

God, Erik loved it when he got passionate. His eyes sparkled and his cheeks flushed and he waved his stubby fingered hands around.

"OK, maybe I'm being a but harsh on my mutants, but the YA stuff isn't exactly in a par with my novel."

Charles hesitated.

"What is it, Charles?"

"Don't get me wrong, your novel is amazing. There are parts where I can't breathe, it's so painful. There are sections that make me laugh till I cry. There are descriptive passages that transport me through space and time. But my heart . . . my heart belongs to "Mutatis Mutandis". You don't know what it means to me, Erik."

"Then tell me," said Erik, softly.

"When I was thirteen and realised I liked girls but I didn't like them, your characters were there to show me I wasn't sick or weird. God knows my home environment was the opposite of supportive. Professor X and Magneto gave me hope. Here were two men, in love, and that love wasn't presented as a problem or a burden, it was natural and wonderful, it was the greatest thing in their lives. They gave me hope, you gave me hope."

Charles eyes were shining. Erik didn't know what to say, except he did.

"And you've given me reality, Charles. Even when I'm writing about blue shapeshifters and red teleporters, it feels real because you can always spot what's fake. You give me the truth. You know the character Jamie?"

Charles nodded.

"He's based on you."

"What, Cupid? The guy who gets his friend to fly him about so he can sprinkle love on the world?"

"Yes."

Charles stared. "But he's Scottish."

Erik smiled. "A pale skinned, dark haired, blue eyed, red lipped Scot."

"Oh. Oh! Erik, thank you."

He smiled that tender smile which made Erik's heart ache.

"Magnus, the dope with the tail and wings who flies him around is based on me."

Charles laughed.

"He's nothing like you. Well, in appearance maybe, but not anything else. I mean, he's hopelessly in love with Cupid and Cupid is utterly oblivious and thinks they're just friends and . . . "

Charles stopped speaking. Erik could see the realisation dawn in his widening eyes. Oh, fuck!

"I'm sorry, Charles, I shouldn't have said anything. I know you don't feel that way about me. I didn't want to burden you with my unwanted feelings. Please say this won't change our friendship."

Charles sat and stared, eyes huge, lips parted. Oh, God, he was so beautiful and good and funny and smart and it was all ruined, Erik had ruined their friendship.

"I'm afraid I can't say this won't change out friendship because it will."

The world didn't end, the sun didn't explode, the moon didn't crash into the earth. No, all that was happening in Erik's head.

"Our friendship will change because I love you too, have done since shortly after we met, but I believed you thought of me only as a friend. I mean, you had all those one night stands and . . . and you never said anything."

Now it was Erik's turn to stare.

"You mean . . . " began Erik.

"Yes."

"All this time . . . "

"Yes."

"You've been in love with me too?"

"Yes."

Then they were kissing and Charles had too many clothes on and so did Erik, so they took them off and touched each other all over with hands and mouths and cocks. And it wasn't the best sex Erik had ever had because they didn't know each other's bodies or tastes and they were both incredibly nervous. Yet at the same time it was absolutely the best sex he'd ever had because it was Charles, Charles, Charles.

Afterwards, when they were lying on the tastefully distressed wooden floor - Charles had picked up a splinter somewhere you really didn't want a splinter - Charles began to giggle.

"What?"

"I can see why you called him "Magnus"," Charles said, looking pointedly at Erik's cock.

The next book in the series was called "Cupid's Arrow", in which Cupid and Magnus finally got together much to the joy of the fans.


End file.
